If by some miracle an immigration bill passes this year, President Obama will have an unlikely ally to thank: Evangelical Christians. While Congressional Republicans oppose such a bill nearly unanimously and Democratic support has wavered, Evangelical leaders are prominently backing Obama's effort, partly due to their growing solidarity with politically active Hispanic Evangelical pastors. And, unlike their Catholic, Jewish, and mainline Protestant counterparts, Evangelical leaders have pull with Republicans. Can the Religious Right save immigration reform?

This is too big for Evangelicals to drop: One of the Evangelical leaders' "greatest challenges" is "persuading their own flocks," say Josh Gerstein and Ben Smith in Politico. And perhaps their "edgier or more novel arguments" — such as "Mexicans are Christians, not Muslims" — will "break through" eventually, even if not this year. But their flocks are also why they'll try again: "Latino immigrants, legal and illegal, represent fertile prospects for proselytizing.""Churches eye immigration's upside"